Escape rooms are exciting recreational activities that involve groups of people solving puzzles to find a way out of a locked room. Typically designed with a particular theme, escape rooms started gaining popularity in Europe and Asia in the early 2010’s. Nowadays, escape rooms can be found in almost every major city in the world. 

Escape rooms are designed with different difficulty levels in mind and some are especially tricky. While people might think that they would need a high IQ to be able to get out of an escape game in Orlando quickly, there are certain ways to prepare oneself. One such way is by practicing puzzles. 

Skills That Will Help You in Escape Rooms

Escape rooms can be tough but there are skills that serve you well. Here are some skills that will help you in escape rooms.

Logic 

Typically, players don’t know what puzzles lie ahead when they sign up for an escape room so logic will be a great help when solving escape room challenges. Puzzles, clues, and answers are typically scattered in escape rooms and are required to be connected somehow. Logic will help a person connect the dots and leave an escape room quickly.  

Memory

Having the entire room at their disposal, escape room designers usually make the most of the space and scatter as many clues and puzzles as they can. Scattering the clues also make it easier for groups to work on since they would each have enough space to work comfortably. 

However, scattered clues means that they aren’t usually in the same line of sight. The answers to the puzzles in an escape room are usually connected in some way and the people have to remember them all to understand how to solve the final puzzle. 

Time Management

To add excitement and pressure to escape rooms, designers would usually include a time limit. This means that groups have to work as efficiently as possible – this is where time management comes in. 

Especially since people have to work on multiple puzzles simultaneously, time management comes in handy so that people won’t stick to one puzzle for too long. Time management will also help decide how much time each puzzle should be allocated. 

Communication

Escape groups tend to suit groups better rather than individual players. While some might think working in a group puts them at an advantage, some escape room players have found working in a group to be counterproductive. 

Escape rooms might contain dozens of different puzzles but they all provide clues that become parts of a whole. Being in a group only becomes an advantage when people are communicating effectively with one another. 

People might get stuck on one puzzle for a long time just because they don’t know that they need information from another puzzle. In escape rooms, communication is key to help bring all the clues together and allow people to leave the room. 

Why Practicing Puzzles Can Help You in Escape Rooms 

Since escape rooms are essentially built on puzzles, it comes as no surprise that practicing puzzles will subsequently help people learn the skills that are transferable to escape rooms. 

It has been found that simple puzzles like sudoku and crosswords work wonders for the brain. They help train the parts of the brain responsible for areas such as logic and memory. A puzzle as simple as The Tower of Hanoi requires logic and a deep understanding of how things work to be completed. 

People can also practice time management with these puzzles by simply giving themselves a time limit. An example of this is trying to solve the Rubik’s cube as fast as they can. Training with a time limit trains the brain to make certain connections in a more timely manner.

Lastly, communication is a definite skill that can be picked up when playing puzzles with other people. Jigsaw puzzles are a great way to practice communication skills when played with companions. Solving a jigsaw puzzle effectively requires more than just fast hands finding the right pieces that fit together. 

As a group exercise, a jigsaw puzzle can help train individuals to delegate work. For example, one might be responsible for finding the corner and edge pieces, another would be responsible for sorting pieces by color, and another would lead and work on the main bulk of the puzzle. 

Conclusion

Escape rooms are a great way to have fun with friends and family but that doesn’t mean you can’t prepare for them. Practicing puzzles can help train your brain with the necessary skills to solve the challenges in an escape room in record time.